AfricaPress-Tanzania: THE Kisutu Resident Magistrate’s Court in Dar es Salaam yesterday acquitted four senior security officers with the Tanzania Airport Authority (TAA), who were charged with several offences, of leading organised crimes and unlawfully dealing in trophies valued at over 267m/-.
Principal Resident Magistrate Huruma Shaidi ruled in favour of Clemence Mbaruck (46), who is Security Manager residing at Mbagala, Emmanuel Nsanganiye (54), Salum Mnyones (33) and Albadri Mshana (31), all security officers, who were living at Ukonga, for the prosecution’s failure to prove the charges.
He pointed out that the prosecution, through the evidence tendered, failed to prove the charges beyond reasonable doubt as required in criminal cases.
The prosecution, according to him, had relied on, among others, cautioned statements of the accused to substantiate the claims.
The magistrate said that the prosecution had also relied on electronic and phone communication evidence to prove the charges.
In his judgment, however, the magistrate found that the cautioned statements were recorded outside the required time of four hours since the arrest of the accused persons.
He also pointed out that in terms of section 58 of the Law of Evidence Act, the police were required to give pieces of papers to the accused person to record on his own what he knows about the crime alleged to have been committed in case he was to admit to the offence.
“Instead, the statement was recorded by the police themselves.
This is a fatal mistake,” the magistrate ruled. As a result, he said, such statements could not be considered by the court to support the charges.
As regard to the other types of evidence, the magistrate held that such evidence was of circumstantial nature which needed to be corroborated by other evidence.
Since there was no other corroborative evidence, the magistrate proceeded to hold that the prosecution had failed to prove the charges.
“Under the circumstances, the accused persons are hereby acquitted forthwith. The right of appeal to either of the parties (prosecution and defence) aggrieved by the court judgment is explained,” Magistrate Shaidi declared.
The racket, according to the prosecution, included unlawful facilitating the export of 150 kilogrammes of elephant tusks valued at 85,110 US dollars, 21 lion teeth valued at 27,079 US dollars and 35 lion claws valued at 15,145 US Dollars, all valued at 127,334 US dollars (about 267,401,400/-).
It was alleged further that on July 5, 2015, at the same airport, the accused persons exported the said 150 kilogrammes of elephant tusks, 21 Lion teeth and 35 lion claws, which are government trophies without a trophy export certificate or a CITES permit from the Director of the Wildlife Division.
The four security officers with the TAA were also charged with an additional count of abuse of their position allegedly committed between July 2 and 5, 2015.
Being employees of TAA, jointly and together, while discharging their duties; they allegedly intentionally abused their positions by facilitating the export of the government trophies without permit, an act which was in violation of the law under the Wildlife Conservation Act.
